Those words were spoken to me in the 1990s by a former fellow cop, in the wake of some sexual harasment or sexual assault report that was then under investigation. I was a detective at the time. I can’t recall what the accusation was or who was under investigation. But I do remember the words of wisdom.

Following my retirement from twenty years in Colorado law enforcement, I spent nearly two years as an investigator with the Colorado State Public Defender’s Office. I did criminal investigations and assisted with prosecutions from both sides of the Courtroom. They included a number of sexual assault accusations, three of which I can specifically remember eventually came to jury trials. Some of the charges were dismissed prior to trial, when powerful exculpatory evidence turned up. I vivdly recall three indigent Public Defender’s Office clients who sat in jail for months on end, awaiting their days in Court. Each was falsely accused of forcible rape. Their freedom was eventually restored to them, because the hard evidence I discovered proved they just didn’t do the crimes. Nevertheless, the lingering aura of a sex complaint accusation never goes away.

So, I’m fascinated with what’s happening to Herman Cain. Thanks to Drudge, you can catch up on the latest news reports on the following links:

What fascinates me is that we have no depositions, facts or specific allegations on which to render judgement. The frenzy of media feeding becomes more savage every day, without a shred of hard evidence, without a transcription of a victim’s sworn statement given to anyone, without anything other than a pile of excrement formed by the words sex, harassment, aggressive, unwelcome behavior, and three victims. The steaming excrement has been picked up by American journalists everywhere, by facebook participants and by television news anchors – and mercilessly thrown onto Herman Cain’s person.

Hold on here, for just a moment. I still think like an investigator. If you make an accusation, show me the evidence before you ask me to form a conclusion. What’s going on now is a terrible pre-judgement, before the facts are in our hands.

So, I’ll ask you a question:

If you stood accused of a sexual harassment complaint that was to be tried in a Court of Law, would you want any of the reporters who wrote the above-linked “reports” sitting on your jury?

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About John L. Work

John Lloyd Work has taken the detective thriller genre and woven an occasional political thread throughout his books, morphing what was once considered an arena reserved for pure fiction into believable, terrifying, futuristic, true-to-life “faction”.
He traveled the uniformed patrolman’s path, answering brutal domestic violence calls, high speed chases, homicides, suicides, armed robberies, breaking up bar fights, and the accompanying sporadic unpredictable moments of terror - which eventually come to all police officers, sometimes when least expected. He gradually absorbed the hard fact that the greatest danger a cop faces comes in the form of day-to-day encounters with emotionally disturbed, highly intoxicated people. Those experiences can wear a cop down, grinding on his own emotions and psyche. Prolonged exposure to the worst of people and people at their worst can soon make him believe that the world is a sewer. That police officer’s reality is a common thread throughout Work’s crime fiction books.
Following his graduation from high school, Work studied music and became a professional performer, conductor and teacher. Life made a sudden, unexpected turn when, one afternoon in 1976, his cousin, who eventually became the Chief of the Ontario, California, Police Department, talked him into riding along during a patrol shift. The musician was hooked into becoming a police officer.
After working for two years as a reserve officer in Southern California and in Boulder, Colorado, he joined the Longmont, Colorado Police Department. Work served there for seven years, investigating crimes as a patrolman, detective and patrol sergeant. In 1989 he joined the Adams County, Colorado Sheriff’s Office, where he soon learned that locking a criminal up inside a jail or prison does not put him out of business. As a sheriff’s detective he investigated hundreds of crimes, including eleven contract murder conspiracies which originated “inside the walls”.
While serving on the Adams County North Metro Gang Task Force and as a member of the Colorado Security Threat Intelligence Network Group (STING), Work designed a seminar on how a criminal’s mind formulates his victim selection strategy. Over a period of six years he taught that class in sheriff’s academies and colleges throughout Colorado. He saw the world of crime both inside the walls and out on the streets.
His final experiences in the criminal law field were with the Colorado State Public Defender’s Office, where for nearly two years he investigated felonies from the defense side of the Courtroom.
Twenty-two years of observing human nature at its worst, combined with watching some profound changes in America’s culture and political institutions, provided plenty of material for his first three books. A self-published author, he just finished writing his tenth thriller.